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Team

Our entire team is committed to helping our portfolio companies achieve their goals to transform financial services. We have devoted our careers to this area—with experience from large institutions to small startups. We are collaborative in our approach. We value creative and quantitative thinking. We take bold actions and learn from them.

Amman Bhasin

Analyst

Rohit Bodas

Partner

Ryan Gilbert

Partner

Hilary Kivitz

COO & General Counsel

David Mort

Vice President

Krista Peters

Executive Assistant

Jay Reinemann

Partner

Jurgen van de Vyver

Finance Associate

Thomas Whiteaker

Partner

"It is not in the stars to hold our destiny but in ourselves."

William Shakespeare

"Life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it."

Charles Swindoll

"Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life."

Steve Jobs

"I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions."

Stephen Covey

Amman Bhasin

Analyst

Amman joined Propel from Keefe Bruyette and Woods (KBW), an investment bank focused on financial services and a subsidiary of Stifel Financial. At KBW, Amman worked on a variety of M&A and capital markets transactions in depositories, specialty finance, and insurance. Prior to KBW, Amman worked at Social Starts, an early stage micro-VC, and spent time with Bowery Capital, an enterprise-focused seed stage fund.

Amman grew up in New York and graduated from New York University’s Stern School of Business.
He’s an avid San Antonio Spurs fan and enjoys playing sports, traveling and reading.

Rohit Bodas

Partner

Rohit leads Propel’s international fund and is looking to partner with entrepreneurs building transformational companies that impact financial services.

Rohit joined Propel from American Express Ventures, which he helped launch in 2011. He has invested in a wide range of areas such as data analytics, AI, enterprise security, payments, and digital commerce. He also led and managed Amex Ventures’ international investments in Europe, Latin America, India, and Asia Pacific. Representative investments include inAuth (acquired), Enigma, Plaid, Signifyd, Trulioo, Capillary Technologies, and Clip.

Earlier in his career Rohit held various positions at Motorola in R&D, business development, and its ventures division. He has developed key mobile video and security technologies and holds seven US patents.

Ryan Gilbert

As a founder, operator, and investor Ryan brings over 20 years of global financial services expertise spanning payments, remittances, credit, security, and compliance to Propel. He serves as the executive chairman of Better Finance/SmartBiz, a small business lending marketplace he founded as an entrepreneur-in-residence at Venrock; the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s nominated director of bKash, Bangladesh’s leading remittance network; and a director of River City Bank in Sacramento. His prior roles include co-founder and CEO of real estate payments company PropertyBridge (acquired by MoneyGram International), an early investor in EventBrite, and a founding advisor to Square. Ryan graduated from the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, and is member of the State Bar of California.

Hilary Kivitz

COO & General Counsel

Hilary oversees operations, finance, and legal matters for Propel. She enjoys providing strategic and operational support to portfolio companies on everything from organizational basics to thinking through their toughest challenges. She joined Propel from another Silicon Valley fintech venture capital fund and began her career at Skadden. She received a JD from Georgetown University Law Center, a BPhil from Oxford University, and a BA in philosophy from UC Berkeley.

David Mort

David has been investing in technologies for financial services since 2013, when he joined BBVA Group, where he focused on venture investments, corporate development, and M&A. He was involved in BBVA’s acquisition of Simple and investments in companies such as DocuSign, Coinbase, and Personal Capital. In his role at Propel, he takes a data-driven approach to evaluating investment opportunities and has a particular interest in computer vision, insurance, mobility, capital markets, and enterprise software. His prior experience includes working with high-growth technology startups and advising corporate venture capital groups at Silicon Valley Bank.

Krista Peters

Executive Assistant

Krista supports the team on a number of fronts including event planning, administration, and project management. She joined Propel from a Palo Alto accounting firm that serves high net worth individuals and tech industry clients. Krista spent a semester at the Universidad de Pais Vasco in Bilbao while earning a BA in international business from the University of Las Vegas Nevada.

Jay Reinemann

Jay has been immersed in the financial services sector throughout his career, much of it as an investor. After college, he worked at Old Kent Financial Corporation (now Fifth Third), Andersen Consulting, and then Visa, where he held operational and investor roles and eventually led Visa’s Corporate Ventures and Strategic Alliances group. At Visa, Jay led investments in Tripwire (acquired by Belden), Good (acquired by Motorola), Mobileway (acquired by Sybase), Application Security (acquired by Trustwave), Spi Dynamics (acquired by HP), Way Systems (acquired by VeriFone), and ISCubed (out of business). After Visa, Jay joined the founding team of an early stage social commerce start-up and founded a fintech venture fund, Altai Ventures, which was slightly ahead of the curve but failed to raise capital during the financial crisis. But the experience only increased his drive for fintech innovation and paved the way for him to join BBVA in 2011.

Jurgen van de Vyver

Finance Associate

Jurgen manages the fund’s various finance functions, including valuations, financial reporting, and day-to-day operations.
He’s a qualified chartered accountant in South Africa, where he previously worked for KPMG. He played rugby and earned a masters degree in accounting and finance at Stellenbosch University.
Jurgen also helped start the Crypto Aquarium, a crypto community on Telegram.

Thomas Whiteaker

Tom brings a breadth of venture investing and operational experience from across the financial services industry to Propel, and is focused on InsureTech and AI. In prior roles he reestablished Hartford Ventures as the leading corporate venture program in the insurance industry, led investments in ecommerce, security, and authentication for Visa’s venture capital program, and co-founded the international division for one of the largest American collection agencies. A graduate of Thunderbird, Tom’s accomplishments include managing a diverse portfolio of investments through the financial crisis, making investments in several global payments companies that led to acquisitions, and building new business units in Mexico City, São Paulo, and Rio de Janeiro.

Propel Venture Partners

Insights

How broadly do we define financial services? What changes will matter most? We are constantly curious about how money and technology interact with the world at large.

"The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams."

Eleanor Roosevelt

"Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value."

Albert Einstein

"I attribute my success to this: I never gave or took any excuse."

Florence Nightingale

"Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right."

Henry Ford

Portfolio

We eagerly partner with entrepreneurs who appreciate the joy of a great user experience, embrace technology, and believe financial services should be faster, cheaper, more secure, and more transparent.